


Five Minutes

by 7minutesinxheaven



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Johnlock - Freeform, M/M, Retirementlock, slight parentlock
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-19
Updated: 2014-01-19
Packaged: 2018-01-09 06:21:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1142529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/7minutesinxheaven/pseuds/7minutesinxheaven
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being married to Sherlock Holmes was a surprised in itself. Growing old with Sherlock, even more so. The days when they were younger had been much different from the days they were facing now.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Minutes

**Author's Note:**

> The following work was based on an Omegle roleplay created January 18th, 2014. Due to disconnect, I lost my roleplay partner- should you find this, stranger, let me know, and I shall give you due credit!

Quiet, simple life is what most young married couples dreamed of, and John too would admit that was something he had wanted, but now it was more than obvious that he had been wearing thick-rimmed rose colored glasses. In the ‘old days’- the fond way that the elderly liked to refer to the past as- they would get up each morning at their own hours, assuming Sherlock slept at all the night before. They would bicker over breakfast, but in that cute, meaningless way that newlyweds did, or at least how they always had. By the afternoon they would have a case, or else John would come home to find a sulking Sherlock in his armchair, or otherwise poised at the table with beakers and acid in hand. Usually by the end of the night they were in each other’s arms, and more often in other places, too.

John had always lived by and relied on routine in his life. When he had been in Afghanistan, there was truly no other way. If you went against your superiors, you’d soon find your career over, or dead. Or both, honestly. In his old age, he needed routine more than anything- it kept him sane. The safe domestic life was only entertaining for so long, and when the highlight of your day was getting up to make breakfast each morning, there was something seriously wrong with your life.

John’s day began at 8:00 AM every morning. He need not rely on an alarm, and he certainly wasn’t effected by how late he stayed up the night before which, granted, was not usually very late anyway. Every morning, 8:00.

He slowly sat up in bed with a slight groan, stretched his arms over his head and listened to the cacophony of popping joints. Everything about him popped and, worse yet, usually hurt, too. The most devastating to happen to John yet were the pain in his hips, which severely limited his mobility. When climbing the stairs became out of the question, they had had to leave 221B. Even to this day, he wondered just how Mrs. Hudson had managed so well. Injuries aside, John could usually manage to stand at the stove and make an appropriately sized meal for the two of them. Gee, what would he cook today. Bacon or sausage? Oatmeal or eggs? Just _so_ many invigorating choices.

Little to John’s knowledge, his husband had developed his own routine, his own rhythm built around John’s. Every morning he woke when John did, when the man slowly stood to start his dull day. He would lay beside him, pretending to sleep even when he had been up for hours, but only hoped that today would be like they had been before. That John would lay back beside him, put his hands on Sherlock’s waist, rest his lips on his neck and whisper. Whisper what, Sherlock didn’t know- it had been that long. He had kept a running tally from the last time they had had sex- going on four months, three weeks and six days- but he had simply lost track of when they had last exchanged I Love Yous. It had been that long.

It wasn’t from lack of effort on his behalf, however. Sherlock Holmes was not an outwardly affectionate person, but he had done all that he could think of. He had wrapped himself around him, draped his arms around John’s waist like a cloak, rest his head on his shoulder while the man made his tea. He was nudged off. Held the screen door open in invitation for John to sit beside him as he tended to his bees. The door fell closed. He held John’s face in his hands, leaned in near to kiss those lips he had always and only ever known. He was turned away from, and his lips stumbled on unshaved stubble, stinging like cactus needles. Every avenue he could think of, he had tried. Beyond talking, anyway.

As John put his slippers on his feet, however, Sherlock had resolved that today was not that day. The bed creaked as John stood up, left for the doorway, but Sherlock cleared his throat.

“Stay.”

John blinked when he heard his husband behind him, that deep but now raspy voice altered by years of smoking. Thankfully now, cocaine and morphine had been traded out for Vicodin and Hydrocodone, in doses moderated by the Tupperware rectangles kept in the bathroom cupboard. He glanced back at the bed from over his shoulder, brows raised curiously.

“Stay?” John asked as if he hadn’t heard him correctly.

Sherlock was quiet as he deliberated on what to say; the first thing that came to mind was out of the question: _Please, John, hold me. Hold me from behind, stroke my stomach, and kiss my neck. Giggle into my ear and tell me that you love me. Please, stay and tell me that you love me again._ There was no sodding way those words were going to be leaving his lips, even if his head screamed.

Even as John stopped and acknowledged him for once, it wasn’t enough for the man to turn toward him, to face him. Just why John had grown so distant over these past months, Sherlock couldn’t understand. Was John unhappy? And for what reason? Sherlock had always thought domestic life would suit John best, but maybe he had been wrong. It drove Sherlock completely mad, most days, but he had John. He always had John, but maybe it wasn’t enough in the reverse.

“Please,” Sherlock said finally, when the silence had permeated the room once again. “Please, John. Stay. For five minutes.”

One thing had not changed over the years: Sherlock Holmes did not say please. Old age seemed to tame some people, and in many ways it had changed the two of them. John was still truly as hot headed as he had always been, but it took a lot to bring him to boil- being angry took a lot of energy. More often than not, lately, he found himself apathetic compared to patient. When their son Hamish cancelled last minute on their plans to see their two grandsons, John had only shrugged. Fine, if Hamish didn’t want to make the four hour drive to let his parents see their grandchildren, the one time a year that they usually got to see them, John would let him. In many ways though, Sherlock seemed unaltered by the silver in his hair. He was quick, intelligent- showed no sign of the mental decay the elderly were associated with. Still, John had learned and accepted long ago that the consulting detective did not say such a menial word like please, not when he had so many ways of getting what he wanted. What he could not obtain through his own means, Mycroft could arrange. Hearing such a rare word brought a frown to John’s face, and he looked down at his slippers, worn and discolored from time. Please? He didn’t know what to make of it.

“Alright,” John agreed, but sounded hesitant. He took the slippers off his feet before he laid back down, and the ancient springs groaned under his weight. He stared up at the ceiling, and began to count the tiles, as he had done time and time again.

Sherlock felt his body literally decompress with relief once John returned to the bed, to his side. It wasn’t much, but it was a start. From under the sheets, Sherlock twirled his wedding band nervously. As tarnished as their rings had grown with age, Sherlock never wanted to have them replaced. They were simple gold circles with plain, ordinary engravings on the insides: _SH & JW_. And as simple as they were, John had had to save his wages for so long before he had presented them to Sherlock on one knee, right in the living room of their flat. No elegant dinner, no wine. Just the two of them in the place where it had all began, and only Billy the skull as witness. On those rare days when Sherlock could convince John to come sit on the patio with him, Sherlock would insist John hold on to his ring, lest he drop it while working with his bees. However, the truth of it was that Sherlock loved how John would take his hand in his and guide the ring on his finger as he had done with they had first married. He genuinely worried, though, that if John knew, he would do it no longer.

“How did you sleep?” Sherlock asked, but had to hide his scoff. Honestly, was this what their relationship had come to? Years and years of crying, laughing, kissing, screaming, shagging, snogging and smiling had been reduced to weather conversation.

“Slept fine,” John answered quietly. Seven, eight, nine. Their room had fifty-seven tiles, roughly an eight by seven square. This much John knew from the nights he lay awake from night terrors. They still haunted him, sometimes, but he did his best to be quiet when he could help it. Counting was one thing that helped, and even now it served as distraction.

Last night hadn’t been so well, if John was honest. Another dream disturbed him, left him sweating, soaking through his pillow. In an hour he had managed to suppress the thoughts, and it was an especially minimal time to lie there awake, compared to the hours and hours he sometimes had to spend tossing and turning until his devils allowed him sleep. And even those nights, he was up at 8:02 at the latest.

“How did you sleep?” John asked in return, but only because it was polite.

Sherlock didn’t answer, not verbally, at least. Instead, he timidly moved closer, laid his head on John’s pillow, and took hold of his husband’s hand. He threaded his fingers through John’s, and lightly stroked the ring on John’s left hand with his finger.

“You could have woken me up, you know. For the nightmare.”

A slow, steady stream of air whizzed between John’s lips. No, Sherlock really hadn’t changed much at all. It was impossible to have a secret around him, but only because he could deduce it out of you.

“Didn’t need to,” John answered, running his tongue over his dry, cracked lips nervously. His eyes shifted to the clock on the nightstand, reading 8:03, and he felt a sort of restlessness rise inside him. This wasn’t the life he wanted, they wanted. They were both miserable, but never said so out loud, where the other could hear.

Going against the promise of five minutes, John took his hand away from Sherlock’s in order to brace himself against the bed, then swung his legs over the side.

“Was thinking of making omelets today,” he said as way of transition while he reached for his dressing gown- not that it mattered. They always woke up with pants on these days.

Sherlock’s eyes immediately turned toward the clock and his fears were confirmed. Three minutes. He couldn’t stand to lay beside him for another 120 seconds? They had had roaring, stupid arguments that hurt less than the figurative pain in his chest and the literally thick, suffocating grip in his throat. He felt the need to bodily pull John back into bed, place the other man’s arms around him,, the way that John was _supposed_ to hold him, and hide away into his chest. To ask him what was wrong, what had happened to make him this way, cold and devoid of feeling. What he had done to deserve this, and what he could do to bring John Hamish Watson back to him.

But he didn’t, and he couldn’t.

Instead he lie on John’s pillow and watched as John’s unfaltering and steady hands tied the knot on his robe, the one with blue, green and brown squares, and maroon lining. His favorite. A present from Sherlock for his fifty third birthday. Sherlock’s head fell heavily on John’s pillow, and for a moment he considered suffocating himself with it, and if John would even notice.

“Couldn’t even make it five minutes, hm?”

John kept his back to Sherlock, because he knew he wouldn’t be able to face him. That was the kind of coward that he was, now. He started for the door, before he heard Sherlock behind him, and stopped. No, not even five minutes.

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. It was the only thing that felt appropriate to say, felt honest. Shaking his head to himself, John left for the kitchen, where he then opened the blinds, and turned on the stove. Back into routine.


End file.
